Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

propublica.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 332 posts

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#41

Post by spankibalt »

skopje wrote: post #23
freedomben wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The truth is somewhere in the middle. Many regulations are terrible and serve as a huge hindrance to innovation, and effectively restrict certain things to only the already-massively-rich entrepreneurs. However, (IMHO) there are a lot of regulations that are important and absolutely should be enforced up front. Finding the right balance is kind of impossible, and I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater,…

>> >Many regulations are terrible and serve as a huge hindrance to innovation What is an example of a regulation that was a "huge" hinderance to innovation? Looking at the past 40 years of the US technological progress and the only thing I seen hindering innovation are the tech companies themselves through monopoly, monopsony, patents, and regulatory capture. (Unless the last one is what you meant, but that's a regul…

> "What is an example of a regulation that was a 'huge' hinderance to innovation?"

Not one (token) example, but "many". But I'm as curious as you are and thirsty for some well-researched and replicated numbers. ;)

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#42

Post by gs17 »

recursive4 wrote: post #30

800 environment violations in service of the development of modern subterranean transportation is a utilitarian trade I'll take any day of the week.

> in service of the development of modern subterranean transportation

It's not really that, it's a weird parody of "modern subterranean transportation". They could do interesting things with it, but right now it's just private roads. It isn't more efficient than a subway, it isn't more flexible, but it's likely more dangerous.

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#43

Post by sebmellen »

3D30497420 wrote: post #39
Seattle3503 wrote: post #35

The tricky thing about environmental regulations is that they are crafted and utilized by NIMBYs to block any infrastructure development. Even if, on balance, the infrastructure is a net positive. It's not clear if these violations actually represent a real environmental hazard or are more reflective of NIMBY degrowth sentiment.

From the article: > Workers have complained of chemical burns from the waste material generated by the tunneling process, and firefighters must decontaminate their equipment after conducting rescues from the project sites. The company was fined more than $112,000 by Nevada’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration in late 2023 after workers complained of “ankle-deep” water in the tunnels, muck spills and burns.…

Yes this sounds quite serious. In line with Elon’s “at all cost” mindset, which is very powerful but also dangerous.

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#44

Post by joering2 »

freedomben wrote: post #14
maxeda wrote: post #2

> “Environmental regulations are, in my view, largely terrible,” he said at an event with the libertarian Cato Institute last year. “You have to get permission in advance, as opposed to, say, paying a penalty if you do something wrong, which I think would be much more effective.” This quote is particularly telling of a billionaire's mindset when the fines are too small to matter.

The truth is somewhere in the middle. Many regulations are terrible and serve as a huge hindrance to innovation, and effectively restrict certain things to only the already-massively-rich entrepreneurs. However, (IMHO) there are a lot of regulations that are important and absolutely should be enforced up front. Finding the right balance is kind of impossible, and I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater,…

This is actually what we would love to have as Gov Department - DORO: Department Of Regulations Overview - a body that would asses each regulation and cut of all these that are unnecessary and were clearly created by politicians/lobbyist/lawmakers bribed by big corp. to "lawfully" eliminate competition.

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#45

Post by freedomben »

skopje wrote: post #23
freedomben wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The truth is somewhere in the middle. Many regulations are terrible and serve as a huge hindrance to innovation, and effectively restrict certain things to only the already-massively-rich entrepreneurs. However, (IMHO) there are a lot of regulations that are important and absolutely should be enforced up front. Finding the right balance is kind of impossible, and I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater,…

>> >Many regulations are terrible and serve as a huge hindrance to innovation What is an example of a regulation that was a "huge" hinderance to innovation? Looking at the past 40 years of the US technological progress and the only thing I seen hindering innovation are the tech companies themselves through monopoly, monopsony, patents, and regulatory capture. (Unless the last one is what you meant, but that's a regul…

Speaking from personal experience running a non-profit seeking to disrupt the entrenched prison communications industry, there have been several. FCC data reporting requirements that took an FTE 200 hours to complete, accessibility requirements that have to be in place before you can (legally) even launch a pilot or MVP, endless legalese documents to parse through, compliance requirements that have to be checked even if they don't make any sense for the application, and some of the best ones: arbitrary requirements like "to be eligible for a proposal/contract, you must be in business at least 10 years and have a minimum $50M in annual revenue" (a requirement clearly written by our incumbent competitors to exclude us that was adopted by the regulators). Oh and all of that stuff you have to deal with before you can even close your first deal.

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#46

Post by freedomben »

3D30497420 wrote: post #22
freedomben wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The truth is somewhere in the middle. Many regulations are terrible and serve as a huge hindrance to innovation, and effectively restrict certain things to only the already-massively-rich entrepreneurs. However, (IMHO) there are a lot of regulations that are important and absolutely should be enforced up front. Finding the right balance is kind of impossible, and I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater,…

In some cases you are correct, however the happy middle in this case probably does not include many (most?) of their violations. One particular example: > Workers have complained of chemical burns from the waste material generated by the tunneling process, and firefighters must decontaminate their equipment after conducting rescues from the project sites. The company was fined more than $112,000 by Nevada’s Occupatio…

Yes to be clear, my statement was meant very generally, not about any of these violations (which do sound pretty bad)

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#47

Post by sgerenser »

recursive4 wrote: post #30

800 environment violations in service of the development of modern subterranean transportation is a utilitarian trade I'll take any day of the week.

It was only a matter of time before the Elon Musk stans showed up.

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#48

Post by torstenvl »

miltonlost wrote: post #26
ceejayoz wrote: post #19

> “Given the extraordinary number of violations, NDEP has decided to exercise its discretion to reduce the penalty to two $5,000 violations per permit, which it believes offers a reasonable penalty that will still serve to deter future non-compliance conduct,” regulators wrote in the letter. The fuck? "You were driving so fast we gave you a discount on the speeding fine."

"You did too much crime. Therefore, we will charge you for fewer crimes! Bulk discount!" This is ridiculous and why we have the problems with late-stage capitalism that we do. Fines are not high enough. No jail time for environmental crimes.

Do you think that isn't how it works?

The guy who gets busted for possession of 1g of cocaine might get 10-30 days, depending on jurisdiction, judge, and prior record.

Do you think the dealer who gets caught with 5 kilos gets between 137 and 410 years?

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#49

Post by ETH_start »

skopje wrote: post #23
freedomben wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The truth is somewhere in the middle. Many regulations are terrible and serve as a huge hindrance to innovation, and effectively restrict certain things to only the already-massively-rich entrepreneurs. However, (IMHO) there are a lot of regulations that are important and absolutely should be enforced up front. Finding the right balance is kind of impossible, and I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater,…

>> >Many regulations are terrible and serve as a huge hindrance to innovation What is an example of a regulation that was a "huge" hinderance to innovation? Looking at the past 40 years of the US technological progress and the only thing I seen hindering innovation are the tech companies themselves through monopoly, monopsony, patents, and regulatory capture. (Unless the last one is what you meant, but that's a regul…

In the U.S., McKinsey estimates that large infrastructure projects typically take 4 to 5 years to go through federal permitting before construction can begin.

https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/public-sector/our-insigh...

Re: Boring Company cited for almost 800 environmental violations in Las Vegas

#50

Post by youngtaff »

jvanderbot wrote: post #9
ck2 wrote: post #5

leaving a toxic mess is a repeated part of Musk's plan with each business it's always privatize the profits, socialize the costs he's doing the same thing with Starlink which is going to vaporize many thousands of toxic satellites out of LEO into the atmosphere https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2025-space-orbit-satellit... imagine what he's going to do on the Moon or Mars

That is a very deceptive video/article (at least the first half above the paywall). It is true that a few of these sats will have to come down each day, but the video is of a booster failure/explosion, not a normal planned obsolescence sat re-entry. And re-entry is part of the cleanup plan . All satellites responsibly launched need a plan to deal with possible orbital waste. By decommissioning in this way, we're redu…

> And re-entry is part of the cleanup plan

Polluting the upper atmosphere with copper, aluminium and other compounds with unknown consequences is hardly a cleanup plan

Post reply on HN